oa 



H0LL1NGER 
P H8.5 

MILL RUN F3-1543 



E 416 

D62 SPEECH 

Copy 1 



HON. JOHN A. MX, OF NEW YORK, 



THE THREE MILLION BILL. 



DELIVERED 



IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES, MARCH 1, 1847. 



WASHINGTON : 

PRINTED AT THE OFFICE OF BLAIR AND RIVES. 

1847. 



c--vj. 



THREE MILLION BILL. 



The Bill appropriating Three Millions of Dollars to enable the President to enter into negotia^ 
tions for the restoration of peace with Mexico being under consideration — 

Mr. DIX said : 

Mr. President: I intended to address the Senate on the general subject 
of the war; but being always more ready to listen than to speak, I have 
given way to others, who were desirous of presenting their views to the Senate. 
And I have done so with pleasure, because I knew that they were much more 
capable than myself of enlightening the judgment of the Senate on the ques- 
tions before it. I have thought the occasion an appropriate one for recurring 
to the principles on which our Government was founded ; of reviewing its prog- 
ress ; of entering into a critical survey of our position as a nation, for the pur- 
pose of estimating intelligently our responsibilities to ourselves and others ; of 
seeing wherein our strength consists ; and of determining by what course of 
policy the permanent interests of the country are most likely to be promoted. 
If I do not mistake prevailing indications, an opportunity may be afforded here- 
after for such a review, and one fully as appropriate as the present. I pass by 
all these grave considerations. I rise for the purpose of saying a few words in 
respect to the position taken by the non-slaveholding States concerning the 
acquisition of territory, and the admission of future States into the Union — a 
position taken by resolutions passed by the legislatures of nine of these States. 
This question is presented by the bill passed by the House, and now awaiting 
the action of the Senate. It has been largely discussed on both sides. New 
York is one of the States, by which resolutions relating to the question have 
been adopted. Her course, as well as that of other States, has been the subject 
of censure here. As one of her representatives on this floor, I wish to say 
something in her vindication, and in reference to the vote I may be called on 
to give, probably at too late an hour for discussion. And, in the first place, I 
desire to state what I understand to be the rights of the original parties to the 
Constitution, in respect to the subject of slavery within their own limits. 

The Constitution of the United States recognised the existence of slavery in 



the thirteen original States, which were parties to that compact. The recog- 
nition was not in direct terms, but by force of certain stipulations designed to 
provide for exigencies, which were the consequences of its existence. These 
stipulations are binding" upon all the members of the Union — as well those 
which were so originally, as those which have since been admitted into it. 
Whatever opinions may be entertained with regard to the political or social 
influences of slavery, the obligation of those who live under the protection of the 
Constitution, to carry out in good faith all its stipulations, is too plain to admit 
of doubt or controversy. It is a solemn obligation, therefore, to leave the States, 
in which slavery exists, unmolested, and free to deal with it according to their 
own interests and conceptions of duty. 

Such I understand to be the rights and obligations of the States, which were 
the original parties to the Federal compact ; and they belong equally to those 
who have since become parties to it. 

I pass to the consideration of admitting new States into the Union, with 
slavery. Whether an organized State, formed from territory not belonging to 
the United States, or, in other words, whether a foreign State, shall be ad- 
mitted into the Union at all, is a problem which may be determined (waiving 
all questions of constitutional power) upon general considerations of expe- 
diency, without regard to the particular conditions, on which it is proposed 
to be received. The admission of Texas is the only case of this kind which 
has occurred since the adoption of the Constitution. Slavery existed in that 
republic at the time of the admission, and we did not require that it should 
be abolished. It is true, the compromise line adopted on the adjustment of the 
Missouri question was fixed as one of the conditions of the admission. Slavery 
was prohibited north of 36° 30' north latitude. But it is equally true, I believe, 
that there was no settlement then, if there is now, in that part of Texas which 
lies north of the parallel of latitude referred to. There was no slavery to be 
abolished. It was an uninhabited wilderness. I believe it to be true, also, that 
Texas, notwithstanding the fundamental condition on which she was admitted 
into the Union — that slavery should not exist above 36° 30' — has extended 
to her whole territory, without reservation, the provisions of her constitution in 
respect to slavery; one of which is, that "the Legislature shall have no powei 
1 to pass laws for the emancipation of slaves, without the consent of their 
'owners; nor without paying their owners, previous to such emancipation, a 
' full equivalent, in money, for the slaves so emancipated. ' 

The reasonings which prevailed with some of those, who voted for the admis- 
sion of Texas, without further restriction, are all resolvable into the single 
fact, that slavery existed in that republic. We took it as we found it. The 
same reasonings applied to the acquisition of foreign territory, in which slavery 



does not exist, demand that it shall be received as we find it, and that we 
shall so maintain it as long as it continues to be territory. If it shall at any 
time thereafter be organized into a State, and. admitted into the Union, it is 
entitled to come in with all the political rights of the original States, and, 
therefore, free to determine for itself what its forms of organization, political or 
social, shall be, provided they are not inconsistent with the obligations of the 
fundamental compact between the States, or with any stipulation or compromise 
in respect to the territory from which it is formed. If slavery exists when 
a State comes into the Union, it may be subsequently abolished in such form 
as the constitution or laws of the State prescribe for expressing the sovereign 
will or assent. On the other hand, if slavery does not exist when a State 
comes into the Union, it may be subsequently established by the act of the 
State, without violating any provision of the Federal Constitution. This free- 
dom of action is inseparable from the sovereignty of the State, and there is no 
authority to control it by Federal laws. 

I have thus stated what 1 understand to be the conceded rights of the States 
in respect to this subject. I admit, to the fullest extent, the exclusive control 
of each State over the subject, within its own jurisdiction. I admit the right of 
the States to be exempt from every species of intermeddling or interference 
within their own limits. I have always acted in conformity with this admission. 
I introduced resolutions in the first meeting ever held at the North in opposition 
to the movements of the Abolitionists. The meeting was held in Albany in 
1835, and its proceedings not only met with the approbation of a large portion 
of the people of the non-slaveholding States of all parties, but I believe they met 
also with the approbation of the whole South. They were founded upon the 
principle I have already stated — perfect freedom in each State, under the guar- 
antees of the Constitution, to determine for itself, without external interference, 
whether it will abolish, continue, or establish slavery within its own limits. 

I return again, for an instant, to the question of acquiring new territory, as 
territory, belonging to other independent nations. We have done so in two 
instances — by the purchase of Louisiana in 1803, and Florida in 1S20. Slavery 
existed in both ; and, at the time of acquiring them, no provision was made for 
abolishing or restraining it. They were, in this respect, taken as they were 
found. 1 refer to these cases, to show that there has been no interference with 
slavery by those who are opposed to it in principle, where it has actually existed, 
when acquiring new territory, and that they have been willing on such occasions 
to leave it to the silent influences of the moral and physical causes, which 
must ultimately determine its limits, both in point of time and geographical 
extent. 

A higher question than any ever yet presented to us is made by this bill. It 



6 

proposes an appropriation of money to purchase territory from Mexico — a 
measure of which I approve. I am in favor of the appropriation and the pur- 
chase. I have always been in favor of acquiring California on just terms. Its 
ports on the Pacific ocean would be invaluable to us, and they are of little use 
to Mexico. 

By a fundamental law of the Mexican Republic, slavery is prohibited 
throughout its political jurisdiction. I know it has been assumed that slavery 
exists in Mexico ; but I believe it will be found that the assertion has been made 
without sufficient consideration. It is not denied that slavery is forever prohib- 
ited by the constitution of Mexico. The prohibition was, I believe, first pro- 
claimed by President Guerrero in 18:29; it has since been ingrafted upon the 
constitution. I am aware that barbarous usages, established under the Spanish 
rule, still continue, and among them some which enforce the collection of 
debts by personal restraint of the debtor. But they do not exceed in barbarity 
the laws of some of the States, in which debt was, until very recently, and is 
perhaps now, treated as a crime, and punished by imprisonment. The old 
colonial usages of Mexico do no more than to compel a debtor to pay his debt 
by labor, and give the creditor a control over his person until it is paid. In the 
city of Mexico, if a common laborer owes money, his creditor may send him to 
a bakery, and keep him there until he has paid his debt. It is a usage of the 
place. The peones, as they are termed, are common laborers. The term was, 
I believe, originally derived from Asia. It was in vogue in the early periods 
of the Spanish dominion in Mexico. In the second despatch of Fernando 
Cortez to the Emperor Charles V., (the first is not extant,) in the original 
Spanish, he speaks of his departure from Vera Cruz with fifteen horse, and 
" trescientos pcones" — three hundred foot-soldiers. The military application 
of the term is obsolete in Mexico, and it is now applied, I believe, exclusively 
to common laborers. They constitute, perhaps, a third of the population of the 
republic. Multitudes of them labor on the large estates (haciendas) for their 
daily bread ; and if they become indebted to the proprietor, he may compel 
them to remain on the estate until they pay I Am This is the extent of what is 
termed slavery in Mexico. It is an arbitrary process of enforcing the payment 
of debts; and it is decidedly more merciful than imprisonment for debt. It is 
a usage regulated by colonial laws, which are yet unrepealed, and it must 
wear out, gradually, like all usages which have become incorporated into 
the social organization of a people, and which are incompatible with its 
spirit. 

I will lead a few passages from a Spanish work on Mexico, ('* Ensayo His- 

lorico de las Revoluciones de Megico" — Political Essay on the Revolutions of 

, Mexico.) which illustrate the condition of that Republic, in respect to this and 



other remnants of her colonial dependence. The author (Zavala) speaks of 
the laboring classes, or peones, thus : 

4 " More than three millions of individuals called suddenly to enjoy the most ample rights of 
citizenship, from the state of the most opprobrious slavery, without any immovable property, 
without a knowledge of any art or employment, and without commerce or industry." 

The following passages sketch graphically the struggle which is in progress 
between arbitrary and liberal principles : 

" From the year 1808 to the year 1830, that is to say, in the space of a generation, such a 
change of ideas, of opinions, of parties, and of interests, has supervened, as to overthrow a recog- 
nized and respected form of Government, and to transfer seven millions of people from despotism 
and arbitrary power to the most liberal theories. Customs and habits alone, which are trans- 
mitted in movements, actions, and continued examples, have not changed; for how can abstract 
doctrines change suddenly the course of life? 

"There is, then, a continual struggle between the doctrines which are professed, the institu- 
tions which are adopted, the principles which are established on the one side, and the abuses 
which are sanctified, the customs which prevail, the semi-feudal rights which are respected on 
the other; between national sovereignty, equality of political rights, the liberty of the press, 
popular government on the one side, and between the interrention of an armed force, privileged 
rights, religious intolerance, and the proprietors of immense estates." 

Mexico is still in a state of political transition, passing from an arbitrary to a 
liberal system, and time will be necessary to enable her to eradicate and cast off 
deeply-seated disorders in her social organization. For more than fifty years 
after the establishment of our independence, debt was punished as a crime in my 
own State. How can we expect Mexico, in less than half that period, to cast off 
all the badges of her colonial servitude ? But to return to the point from which 
I departed — she has a provision in her constitution prohibiting slavery forever. 

Shall the territory we acquire from her come to us with this prohibition, or shall 
it be made an area for the further extension of slavery ? In other words, shall 
we purchase territory where slavery is now prohibited, and virtually rescind the 
prohibition ? Shall we ingraft slavery upon territory where it does not lawfully 
or constitutionally exist, using the arms of the Union to conquer, or the treasure 
of the Union to purchase, it? These are the questions presented to us ; and the 
resolutions passed by the Legislatures of New York and other non-slaveholding 
States have anticipated and given them negative answers. The New York resolu- 
tions declare, that " if any territory is hereafter acquired by the United States, or 
' annexed thereto, the act by which such territory is acquired or annexed, what- 
' ever such act may be, should contain an unalterable fundamental article or 
' provision, whereby slavery and involuntary servitude, except as a punishment 
' for crime, shall be forever excluded from the territory acquired or annexed ;" 
and they instruct the Senators from the State to " use their best efforts to carry 
into effect the views expressed in the foregoing resolutions." 

This vote of instruction passed the Senate unanimously, the question upon it 



8 

having been taken separately from the other resolutions. All parties and divis- 
ions of party concurred in the propriety of the instruction, and of course in the 
subject-matter of the resolutions ; for it is not to be supposed that any one wouM 
vote to instruct Senators to do what he believed wrong. I ought to state, that 
three votes in the Senate out of twenty-six, (the whole number,) and nine votes 
in the House out of one hundred and five, were cast against the resolution con- 
taining the proposed restriction ; but I believe. all the members who gave these 
twelve votes, with, perhaps, a single exception, avowed themselves in favor of 
the principle asserted, though they voted against the resolution, because they 
objected to the form in which it was presented or the time- selected for passing 
it. I believe I may safely say, that there is no difference of opinion in the Legis- 
lature on the subject of excluding slavery from any territory hereafter to be 
acquired. I have no knowledge of the views of the members, excepting so far 
as they may be inferred from the terms of the resolution. I have had no commu- 
nication, direct or indirect, with any one of them. But it may be reasonably 
presumed that their conclusions were strengthened by the fact, that in the terri- 
tory bordering upon us on all sides, slavery is excluded, and that to receive it 
without restriction would be, according to the construction of those whfj oppose 
restriction, to extend and establish slavery where it is not now permitted to exist. 
On this question, I believe I hazard nothing in saying, that not only New York, 
but all the non-slaveholding States, are undivided in opinion. 

Mr. President, in the adoption of the resolutions to which I have referred, the 
aon-slaveholding States have taken no new ground. It is older than the Constitu- 
tion under which we live. It belongs to the era of the Confederation ; to the period 
of partial organization, which intervened between the adoption of the Articles of 
Confederation and the establishment of the Federal Government. In 1787, 
when a government was instituted for the territory northwest of the Ohio river, 
by the same men, or the associates of the same men, who were the authors of 
the Declaration of Independence and the framers of ftie Constitution, they inclu- 
ded in the ordinance a provision prohibiting slavery and involuntary servitude. 
I will read it to the Senate : 

" There shall be neither slavery nor involuntary servitude in the saiil Territory, otherwise 
than in the punishment of crimes, whereof the party shall have been duly convicted: Provided, 
Hump, That any person escaping into the same, from whom labor or service is lawfully claimed 
in any one of the original States, such fugitive may be lawfully reclaimed, and conveyed to the 
person claiming his or her labor or service aforesaid." 

The proviso in the bill which came from the House is in substance the same. 

I have referred to the year 1787 as the period of ibe adoption of the provision 
1 have read. But it had, in fact, a still earlier origin. It was proposed in 1784 
by Mr. Jefferson, but failed for want of the votes of the requisite number of 



States. The thirteen original States then composed the Confederation ; the 
votes were taken by States, each State counting one ; seven States, or a major- 
ity, were necessary to carry any question ; some questions could only be decided 
affirmatively by nine votes; and this proposition received the votes of only six 
States. Maryland, Virginia, and South Carolina, at that time voted against it. 
North Carolina was divided. Mr. Jefferson of Virginia, the author of the pro- 
vision, and Mr. Williamson of North Carolina, voted in its favor. The author of 
the Declaration of Independence and the author of the slavery restriction in the 
ordinance of 1787, are the same person. The principles proclaimed in the one 
were doubtless designed by the ■author to be practically enforced in the other. 
He stands before the world, as far as the obligations of our social condition per- 
mitted, consistent with himself. 

The ordinance, of which the provision I have quoted is a part, finally passed 
in the affirmative in 1787, with a slight modification in its terms. It received 
the votes of eight States. There was but one vote against it, and that was 
given by a member from New York, though the vote of the State was given for 
it. Georgia, South Carolina, North Carolina, and Virginia, unanimously sup- 
ported it. Much of the Northwestern Territory was then a forest ; and, in the 
hands of the fathers of the Constitution, its future destiny was placed. They per- 
formed their duty under that high sense of conscientiousness and responsibility 
which seems to have guided all their deliberations in providing for their own gov- 
ernment and that of the States then about to spring up in the bosom of the wil- 
derness; and I venture to say that the entire population of that wide-spread 
territory, now instinct with life, and strength, and freedom, and intelligence, and 
all the blessings of civilization, looks back with approbation and gratitude upon 
the conduct of those, who gave direction and shape to the political character of 
the communities it contains. 

The non-slaveholding States have, by their resolutions, placed themselves upon 
the ground taken by Jefferson more than sixty years ago. Circumstances render 
the position of Jefferson even higher than that now taken by them. Slavery 
existed de jure, if not de facto, in the Northwestern Territory in 17S7. The 
ordinance was a virtual abolition of it. The proposition, originally made in 1784 
by Mr. Jefferson, was that after the year 1800 it should cease to exist. He pro- 
posed to take sixteen years for its abolition. The ordinance, as it passed, went 
into immediate effect. The non-slaveholding States only ask, that in the acqui- 
sition of territory now free, slavery shall not be established. In the one case, it 
was abolished where it existed ; in the other, it is only proposed to be excluded 
where it does not exist. 

The course of the non-slaveholding States has been denounced as aggressive. 
Sir, it has, from the earliest period, been liberal and forbearing. They have 



10 

acquiesced in all the propositions which have been made from time to time to add 
southern territory to the Union ; they have concurred in appropriating money for 
the purpose, contributing their own share, and thus bearing a part of the burden of 
the purchase. They united in the purchase of Louisiana, in the purchase of Flori- 
da, and in the annexation of Texas. They have contributed in these cases to the 
extension of slavery over a geographical area exceeding that of the thirteen origi- 
nal States — equal to four-fifths of that of the original States and their territories. 
They have voted for the admission of States from Louisiana and Florida, with 
provisions in their constitutions not only recognising slavery, but prohibiting its 
abolition by the legislative power of those States. They have acceded to all 
this upon the principle of leaving the States free to regulate this subject for 
themselves within their own limits. In Texas, slavery existed only nominally. 
That republic had an area of more than three hundred thousand square miles, 
according to the boundaries claimed by its Congress. Its population, bond and 
free, when admitted into the Union, did not exceed one hundred and fifty thou- 
sand souls. It was, for the most part, unpopulated. Its admission into the 
Union with slavery, was therefore a virtual extension of slavery over an area 
equal to more than half the area of the original thirteen States. We were told 
that attempts had been made by foreign Governments to abolish slavery in Texas, 
aud that the success of these attempts would endanger the domestic tranquillity 
of the southern States. The non-slaveholding States were appealed to, on this 
and other grounds, to unite in the immediate annexation of Texas. They yielded 
their assent. In all this they have acquiesced. Sir, they have done more ; they 
have contributed to it ; for it could never have been accomplished but by the aid 
of northern votes. They believe they have fulfilled towards the South every 
obligation of fraternal duty. And yet they are accused of aggression, because 
they will not consent to the extension of slavery to free territory. 

We have been told by our southern friends, with few exceptions, that they 
regarded slavery as a moral and social evil, for which they were not responsible — 
an evil forced upon them by foreign rulers during their colonial dependence. It 
is under this view of the subject that they have been sustained by their friends 
in the North, not only in the full possession and enjoyment of all their rights over 
this subject within their own limits under the Constitution, (this is a duty none 
should be so unscrupulous as to disregard.) but in purchasing slave territory, and 
establishing slaveholding States. Acquisition has gone on uninterrupted by 
us, and indeed aided by us, until there is no longer any slave territory on this 
continent to bring into the Union. We have literally absorbed it all. 

The non-slaveholding States are now asked to go further : to purchase free ter- 
ritory and leave it open to the extension of slavery : to extend to free soil and to 
free communities an evil \s Inch our southern friends have told us was forced upon 



11 

them against their wishes and consent. The unanimity with which the Legis- 
latures of New York, Pennsylvania, Ohio, and other States, have acted in refer- 
ence to this proposition, is but an index to the universal opinion which pervades 
the whole North and West. They never can give their assent to it. It is 
regarded by all parties as involving a principle which rises far above the fleeting 
interests of the day — a principle which they should not be asked to yield ; for 
by yielding it, they would consider themselves instrumental to the extension of 
what they believe to be wrong, and what, in their opinion, nothing but 
necessity can justify. 

If the principle by which the non-slaveholding States have been governed in 
acquiring territory is acquiesced in, this question may be settled in a moment, 
and without agitation. Let the territory, if any is acquired, be taken as it is 
found — with the provision of the Mexican constitution abolishing slavery forever. 
Apply to it the principle which was applied to Florida and Texas. The 
non-slaveholding States have never refused to acquire territory with slavery 
where it actually existed. Let the South not refuse now to take free territory 
where slavery does not exist, and leave it free. 

We are told that slavery must not be excluded from the territories, because 
emigrants from the southern States cannot go there with their property, or, in 
other words, their slaves, and that this would be " an entire exclusion of the 
slaveholding States." Sir, I do not so understand it. It is not exclusion to the 
slaveholder, nor is it exclusion to the free laborer of the South who owns no 
slaves. The slaveholder who emigrates to territory where slavery does not 
exist may employ free labor. The free laborer of the South who emigrates to 
free territory is surely not injured in his condition. It is not so with the free 
laborer of the North in respect to slave territory. He will not go where he is 
compelled to toil side by side with the slave. He is as effectually excluded as 
he would be by a positive prohibition. He will not emigrate with his property 
to territory open to slaves. The property of the free laborer is in himself — in his 
powers of exertion, his capacity for endurance, in the labor of his hands. To 
him these are of as much value as the property which the master has in his 
slaves. I am not very familiarly acquainted with the internal condition of the 
southern States; but I suppose there is a very numerous class in them, especially 
in Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina, Kentucky, and Missouri — I mean the 
non-slaveholding free laborers — who will be benefited by providing that territory, 
which is free when acquired, shall remain free. I think I am not mistaken in 
supposing this class to be far more numerous in some, if not all the States I have 
named, than the class holding slaves. Am I mistaken in supposing, free labor is 
a powerful, if not a dominant, interest in the States referred to ? Wherever 
free labor has gone forth on this continent, the forest has bowed before it ; towns 



12 

and villages have sprung up like magic in its track ; canals, railroads, and busy 
industry, in all its imaginable forms, have marked its progress; civilization, in its 
highest attributes, follows it ; knowledge and religion go with it hand in hand. 
Obliterate everything else, and you may trace its march by the school-house, 
sowing broadcast the seeds of intelligence, and the spire, " losing itself in air, 
as if guiding the thoughts of man to Heaven." Sir, I speak of free labor 
everywhere — in the South as well as the North. Even on the hypothesis of 
an equality in the claims of free and slave labor, (which I do not admit,) the 
argument in favor of taking this territory as we find it, appears to me unan- 
swerable. 

Mr. President, I would not have voted to connect the proviso in the bill 
passed by the House, and now awaiting the action of the Senate, with any 
measure for the prosecution of the war. My State would not have desired it. 
The resolutions of the Legislature are in favor of all proper measures for the 
prosecution of the war. From the commencement of the war, my honorable 
colleague and myself have sustained all measures recommended by the Admin- 
istration for carrying it on ; and as a member of the Committee on Military 
Affairs, I have had some share in maturing them. I have voted for the 
pecuniary means asked for, the number and description of troops which were 
deemed necessary for the purpose, and a commanding general for the armies in 
Mexico, with a rank in some degree commensurate with the numerical force to 
be combined, and moved in combination. I have opposed all propositions to 
clog military bills with extraneous matter, thus postponing our action upon them 
at a critical period in the campaign. The bill under consideration is of a 
different character. It is a proposition to purchase territory. My friend, the 
chairman of the Committee on Foreign Relations, [Mr. Sevier,] with his 
characteristic frankness and directness of purpose — qualities as honorable in a 
legislator as they are in a man — has gone so far as to indicate the extent of the 
acquisition which, in his opinion, we ought to expect — California and New 
.Mexico. The object, then, is not in doubt. It is avowedly to acquire foreign 
territory. Under these circumstances, is it not appropriate to know on what 
terms foreign territory shall become territory of the United States, when on these 
terms may depend the propriety of applying the public treasure to make the 
purchase? The Legislature of New York so considered it. The questions of 
time and circumstances were fully discussed bt fore the adoption of the resolu- 
tions. The proposition under discusssion is not a measure for the prosecution 
of the war. It was not deemed an indispensable peace measure; for when the 
pecuniary claims are all on our side,, an appropriation of money necessarily 
contemplates objects beyond that of making peace. I say this in justice to the 
iNew York Legislature, as well a its Representatives in Congress, who were, 



13 

with a single exception, unanimous in favor of the proviso. If it shall fail to receive 
the sanction of the Senate now, it must again arise on any proposition to acquire 
new territory, and arise in a form in which a decision cannot be avoided. It will 
be sustained with greater unanimity ; for those who now hesitate on the point of 
time, or from a natural desire to postpone the settlement of embarrassing issues, 
will be found in its favor. 

Whatever doubt may have been entertained heretofore with regard to the 
necessity of making the declaration contained in the proviso, I think there can 
be none now. It is distinctly assumed that there is no power under the Con- 
stitution to prohibit slavery in the Territories. While it is contended that there 
is power under the Constitution to acquire slave territory, and to introduce slave 
States into the Union, it is denied that there is any authority to restrain or pro- 
hibit slavery in free territory. We have gone on and introduced into the Union 
all the slave territory on this continent ; and when we reach free territory, we 
are told that the extension of the provisions of the Constitution to it renders it, 
ipso facto, by virtue of the compromises of the Constitution, open to slavery. 
According to this construction, the extension of our Constitution and laws to 
any portion of the Mexican territory, either by conquest or peaceful acquisition, 
overturns the local law, overturns the provision of the constitution of Mexico, 
which declares slavery to be forever prohibited. Mr. President, is this the true 
interpretation of the Constitution under which we live ? Is it armed with full 
power to bring slave territory into the Union, but void of all power to bring in 
free territory, and maintain it free ? Is this the Government, to use the language 
of Jefferson, our fathers fought for? The construction referred to would estab- 
lish as a fundamental provision of the acquisition of new territory that it shall 
be open to slavery, even though free when acquired. Sir, I have not time, at 
this late period of the session, to discuss this question with the deliberation and 
care its importance demands. But a future occasion may come, and I will not 
shrink from the discussion. 

I have heard with great regret the dissolution of the Union spoken of in 
connexion with this measure. I can hardly think those who so connect the two 
subjects are aware of the position in which they place themselves. It is virtu- 
ally declaring, that unless we will consent to bring free territory into the Union, 
and leave it open to the extension of slavery, the Union shall be dissolved. Our 
southern friends have heretofore stood upon the ground of defence : of maintain- 
ing slavery within their own limits against interference from without. The ground 
of extension is now taken, and of extending slavery upon free territory. I can- 
not believe this position will be sustained by the southern States. It is new 
ground, and it is taken with avowals which are calculated to spread surprise 
and alarm throughout the non-slaveholdins; States. 



14 

The course of the non-slaveholding States under these new developments will, 
I doubt not, be steady and firm. No State will stand by the Union with a more 
inflexible determination to maintain it than New York — none will adhere more 
tenaciously to all the obligations of the Constitution. And yet, sir, none could 
hope for a higher career of prosperity, if the States were to be dissevered. In eigh- 
teen years, her entire debt, under the provisions of her new constitution, will be 
paid, and she will be left with an annual surplus income of at least three millions 
of dollars from her internal improvements, after defraying all the expenses of her 
government. Standing, as she does, on the line of commercial intercourse between 
the Atlantic and the great lakes, with the rich and productive States bordering on 
them, the addition of the custom-house to her internal channels of communica- 
tion would make her the wealthiest community, in proportion to her population, 
within the pale of civilization. She would be an empire in herself. But she 
scorns to enter into an estimate of these advantages. She will not ;: calculate 
the value of the Union." She prefers to stand, as she does, on the same footing 
with the smallest of the States, herself the most populous and powerful, rather 
than to stand foremost and preeminent in the field of disunion. In whatever 
manner this question shall be decided, she will be found on the side of the Union, 
not to resist dismemberment by force — for disunion is better than intestine war — 
but to contribute by her influence and her counsels to uphold the fabric of the 
federative system. 

Mr. President, I regret to hear either disunion or civil war spoken of in con- 
nexion w ith this measure. But, I repeat, the former is to be preferred to the lat- 
ter. In wars waged with foreign countries, deplorable as they always are, there 
are some moral fruits which atone, in fc a slight degree, for their accompanying evils. 
There is the sense of national honor, the parent of high achievement ; the sen- 
timent of patriotic devotion to the country, which shrinks from no labor or sacri- 
fice in the public cause ; and the feeling of mutual sympathy and dependence, 
which pervades and unites all classes in the hour of adversity and peril. Far 
as they are overbalanced by the domestic bereavement and the public evil which 
war always brings in its train, they serve to purify the thoughts of something of 
their selfishness, by turning them away from the sordid channels in which they 
are too apt to run. But civil war has no ameliorations. It is pure, unmixed 
demoralization. It dissolves all national and domestic ties. It renders selfish- 
ness more odious, by wedding it to hatred and cruelty. The after generation, 
which reaps the bitter harvest of intestine war, is scarcely less to be commiser- 
ated than that by whose hands the poisonous seed is sown. Less, far less ;han 
these, would be the evils of disunion. 

But, sir, we shall have neither. The interests, the feelings, the good sense of 
the country, all revolt at internal dissension in every form. If this question shall 



15 

be decided against the non-slaveholding States ; if their voice shall be unheeded ; 
New York will not, for that reason, listen to any suicidal project of dismember- 
ment. No, sir ; no. By no agency of hers shall the fraternal bonds which unite 
her to her sisters be rent asunder. Their destiny, whatever it may be, shall be 
also hers. Be it for evil or for good, she will cling to them to the last. But I 
say for her, and in her name, and 1 believe I do not misunderstand her resolu- 
tions, that she can never consent to become a party to the extension of slavery to 
free territory on this continent. If it is to be extended to new areas — areas 
now consecrated to free labor — the work must be done by other hands than 
hers ; and she must leave it to time and to the order of Providence to determine 
what shall be the legitimate fruits of measures which she believes to be wrong, 
and to which she can never yield her assent. 



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